The Adirondacks

July 9

Now that "black fly season" is past, we made our way to the Adirondacks for a weekend of canoeing and camping. The first night we spent at Rollins Pond Campground, which is the extension of the more famous Fish Pond Campground. It's very tight car camping with well over 300 sites. A truck comes by selling ice and firewood. That is shortly followed by an ice cream truck. We didn't quite get through our foil dinners before the ice cream truck came through, so we had our dessert first.

Isla entertained us by doing magic tricks with tissues in her many pockets.

The next day we rented canoes and gear to go canoeing for two days. It was the first time the kids had been camping away from the car. They all held up really well, even when paddling across some fairly big and windy lakes.

Lunch and map break

Chad and Oliver tried to avoid a portage by going through this culvert. The drop-off at the other side dumped Chad, but not Oliver or the contents of the canoe. Benjamin, Isla and I took the portage instead!

Isla was particularly tasty for the black flies. Luckily she did not welt up around the bites like I did.

Chad and I were pretty exhausted from portaging two canoes and five people for two days. After getting off the lakes, we camped at another car campground and ate at a brewery that night. The next morning we hiked up and down Giant Peak. The online reviews had said that it could be done with small children in about four hours. It took us 7 1/2 hours, so we are guessing that the "small children" must be referring more to 12-year-olds than 5-year-olds. Isla was pretty pooped by the time we got done hiking. We ended up eating dinner in Lake George and making a much later drive home on Sunday that we had planned.

We've spent some time at the Dryden library this week. We thought it was funny to snap a picture at Dryden Time Square!

With all the rain, our house is forever surrounded by a moat. Isla spent quite a bit of time splashing in the mud one afternoon.